but for
the resistance of the air), and would reach the ground in the same time.

And he was not content to be pooh-poohed and snubbed. He knew he was
right, and he was determined to make every one see the facts as he saw
them. So one morning, before the assembled University, he ascended the
famous leaning tower, taking with him a 100 lb. shot and a 1 lb. shot.
He balanced them on the edge of the tower, and let them drop together.
Together they fell, and together they struck the ground.

The simultaneous clang of those two weights sounded the death-knell of
the old system of philosophy, and heralded the birth of the new.

But was the change sudden? Were his opponents convinced? Not a jot.
Though they had seen with their eyes, and heard with their ears, the
full light of heaven shining upon them, they went back muttering and
discontented to their musty old volumes and their garrets, there to
invent occult reasons for denying the validity of the observation, and
for referring it to some unknown disturbing cause.

They saw that if they gave way on this one point they would be letting
go their anchorage, and henceforward would be liable to drift along with
the tide, not knowing whither. They dared not do this. No; they _must_
cling to the old traditions; they could not cast away their rotting
ropes and sail out on to the free ocean of God's truth in a spirit of
fearless faith.

[Illustration: FIG. 37.--Tower of Pisa.]

Yet they had received a shock: as by a breath of fresh salt breeze and
a dash of spray in their faces, they had been awakened out of their
comfortable lethargy. They felt the approach of a new era.

Yes, it was a shock; and they hated the young Galileo for giving it
them--hated him with the sullen hatred of men who fight for a lost and
dying cause.

We need scarcely blame these men; at least we need not blame them
overmuch. To say that they acted as they did is to say that they were
human, were narrow-minded, and were the apostles of a lost cause. But
_they_ could not know this; _they_ had no experience of the past to
guide them; the conditions under which they found themselves were novel,
and had to be met for the first time. Conduct which was excusable then
would be unpardonable now, in the light of all this experience to guide
us. Are there any now who practically repeat their error, and resist new
truth? who cling to any old anchorage of dogma, and refuse to rise with
the tide of advancing knowle